Yosemite National Park, CA: 17+ miles Tamarack Flat to El Cap Summit

Alex, Kim, and Curt pre hike (Photo credit: The man himself- Cinnamon, yes like the spice)

We had all been itching to get up for an overnight hiking adventure and what better day than Memorial Day! And what better overnight than on top of El Capitan! Alex had Monday and Tuesday off so we left Monday morning in the Zinger and arrived an hour later in Yosemite to sign in with the wilderness office for an overnight permit and more importantly to get our bear canister (a must if you don't want to wake up in the middle of the night with a black bear on top of you).  Alex (or as we call him our Hippie Sherpa Guide) had done some pre-planning and researched the best starting point for us: Tamarack Flat Campground. So we headed up the Tioga pass road to our parking and trailhead spot.

Curt and Hippie Sherpa Guide Alex

As we pulled into the Tamarack Flat campground, it was unclear as to the best spot to park, so we turned the Zinger around and just outside the campground limits, we saw a motorhome parked in what looked like one of two "ok-to-park-in" parking spaces. As we got our gear together and had a preliminary IPA to get us psyched up for the hike, a man came walking up. After a few words we realized it was his motorhome and he proceeded to recall some amazing life stories to us. It must have been a half hour before we peeled ourselves away but not before we learned his name. Of course, his name was Cinnamon, yes like the spice. Cinnamon took our picture (after a small tutorial of how to work the i-phone camera), we shook his hand, and were on our way.

2.5 miles in we crossed a bridge!

At about 2 1/2 miles in, we stopped and ate our lunch. Within a half a mile from our lunch spot we met up with a group of about 20-30 men all on a day hike. As we put our heads down and sped up to pass them all, it proved difficult as they were so uniquely spaced apart. Finally, we hit a straight away that would prove to be the point to pass them all and one of them sparked up conversation and asked where we were hiking to or from. As we told him our plans, he remarked we had missed our turn and laughing, we ignored him and kept walking. But alas, he was persistent enough that we eventually realized that in our haste to pass this large group of jolly men, we had indeed missed by an accumulated mile our much needed turn.  So, as we let the majority of these men pass us back, we laughed to ourselves and got on our way, the right way.

Set up camp at the top of El Cap

Notice the deer in the background?

 So, our 8 1/2 mile trek up El Capitan turned into 9 1/2 but we were sure as hell not complaining once we got to the summit! We found an incredible spot under a tree with rock walls built up around and an awesome campfire spot.  We immediately set up camp, started a fire, and were pleasantly interrupted by a family of deer who joined us for the remainder of the night at a comfortable distance. It was an unreal feeling to be on top of one of the most impressive granite Monoliths in the midst of unpredictable weather and unbridled wildlife. We had PB&J for dinner and decided to finish the night with an El Cap party. We hadn't been too good at bringing the right amount of water but we made up for it with alcohol which was a good thing since we needed help sleeping as it started pouring around 10pm and didn't stop until we awoke around 6am.  We were thankful for this weather because it brought some amazing views that became majestic as we were high up enough enough to be within the clouds!

Half Dome in a cloud of awesomeness!

We were planning on hiking an additional 2 1/2 miles the next morning but the clouds turned us away from the trek as where we were going was contingent on the sky's weather for views. We started our descent and low and behold, who do we run into but Cinnamon himself! After another 10 minutes of conference with this legendary man, we headed on our way deciding that we too needed spice names. Alex, Sugar; Curt, Nutmeg (cause he's from CT and that's the nutmeg state); Kim, Paprika. Could you tell we had begun our exhaustion phase of the hike? Well, even though we were exhausted, we made it back to the Bug just in time for dinner and a reminder we had planned a Bug party with coworkers. And the adventure went on!  Check out all our awesome pics from this super hike here.